To the editor: Whatever happened to freedom of speech? Whatever happened to the right of someone to have their own opinion? While I don’t condone any of what these people said, or any others like it, people are entitled to their own opinion.

We don’t have to like it, seems like someone once said “ I may not agree with what you said, but I WILL, defend to the death, your right to say it “. I think I remember that from history, one of our founding father’s if I remember correctly.

Now, that being said, just because I think you should be free to say what your opinion is, doesn’t mean I will be upset if someone punches you in the mouth if you insult them! I won’t be upset if your employer fires you for saying it! I won’t be upset if your show is canceled because of what you said!

And use common sense, if you don’t want to get punched, keep it private. There is virtually no way to keep something private with so many people around taking your picture, or filming you with a cell phone.

I also feel we all should be more concerned with our own behavior rather than someone else. Someone may want to punch us in the mouth for what we say, or do, as an individual.

Don Posman

Rochester

Not gay issue

To the editor: Regarding the letter from Caroline French in Foster’s 12/24 about A&E and Duck Dynasty.

I do not watch DD, never heard of Phil Robertson prior to this controversy. However, now that it is everywhere I took the time to find out what he said to cause such an uproar.

It was rude, crude and unacceptable. But, the man is entitled to his opinion, all the more so when it is a religious belief.

Ms. French may not like what he had to say and that is her right, but it is not her right to dictate to Mr. Robertson or anyone else what to say or how to think. This not a “Gay” issue, it is a First Amendment issue.

Ms. French, by her statements, displays the same intolerance that she accuses Mr. Robertson of displaying. Her question as to “How old was Phil when he decided to be straight” is a bit snarkey ... as though “being straight” is some sort of a crime. She further states that the network and Phil are going up against our “democratic” values.

According to the media, it is only the Republicans that have values while Democrats have causes. Hmmm, is there a change in the wind?

And I don’t believe that Ms. French has read the Bible very closely. Nothing in the Bible supports either slavery or homosexuality! I sense a bit of a double standard in her letter.

Tom Seiler

Dover

People are human beings

To the editor: I see a lot of people in public that would have appalled me a few years ago. After having worked in a state mental hospital, and having been at risk once to bodily harm the guardians there could have done nothing about right in front of me, I can have only respect for those caretakers. They have to treat these inmates of their own minds -call them what they are- with that same respect, regardless of conditions.

I have seen elderly and mentally limited persons in public libraries and in malls. It is still a fact that families caring for their own have little or no support from the government. They have to constantly fight for what help they do get. The new AHA should do something to make helping care for relatives more bearable.

Victims of violence are PTSD patients. They need counseling services, sometimes for several years. Most women who are in a bad relationship are most at risk for assault or death -along with their children- when they move to terminate the relationship.

If people must earn benefits in the workplace to get any, what of the spouses who stayed at home raising the children? If no children are raised at home, are they to be institutionalized from birth, and people paid to care for them? I do not see this as a good consequence of having merit-based “benefits”. The people in need of them can’t wait; the ill, the injured, the permanently or temporarily impaired, and those caring for other human beings out of love. None of us are immune to catastrophe. We can’t limit help to those who have earned it first.

Diane M. Starkey

Rochester

Skeptical

To the editor: I recently read in the news how Maine’s Governor Paul LePage is going after (suspected) welfare fraud in a big way. We should arch an eyebrow when LePage suggests he has no problem with those genuinely in need of assistance, that the state will go after only those abusing the system.

I am sure there are indeed some entitlement-addicted welfare scammers in any state. But anyone with a measurable I.Q. should be extremely skeptical of LePage and his followers acting as if they really care all that much about the less fortunate. Maine’s governor — I would bet — many other fiscal conservatives — apparently love to hate the poor and assume that their financial woes are almost always their own darned fault. Maine’s current governor and his lock-step loyalists evidently need to believe that myth for some reason.

Again, I believe there are indeed some shameless people who rip off the system, but Lepage and Company like to paint with a pretty broad brush when it comes to welfare fraud. His “welfare re. form” crusade stinks to high heavens.

Lyndon Johnson, admittedly a horribly flawed president, at least had his altruistic War on Poverty in the 1960s. Even Richard Nixon in the 1970s considered providing a guaranteed annual basic income for those in need (didn’t happen). Today, though, we in the Pine Tree State seem to have not a new War on Poverty but instead a War Against the Poor, led by Maine’s current governor.

Oh sure, this time of year, some conservatives briefly sentimentalize the impoverished and then ease their consciences through canned food drives and sundry charities — especially between Thanksgiving and Christmas. Sure, that’ll do the trick! No, it won’t. Charity just isn’t enough, even when it’s sincere and well-intended. “God bless us, everyone,” as Tiny Tim said.

I don’t know that there is a single answer to suspected welfare reform. Maybe “workfare” would be one answer. Possibly we as a society can come up with some kind of an economic incentive for those on relief who can’t afford kids to hold off having them till they, as potential parents, can provide for a family themselves. That idea may sound audacious; however, tragically poor people on welfare begetting several kids without the financial means to support them just seems less than responsible and perhaps even cruel.

Relying on the likes of Paul LePage and his welfare reform posse can’t be the answer. How about a genuinely bipartisan group of legislators working together regularly with local community leaders to address welfare issues incisively, fairly and humanely? Maybe that’ll work.